Okay, I said I\u2019d get down to details in setting up \u201cphotopia.\u201d\u00a0 Well, where do we start?\u00a0 The first question is how do you start such a thing from where we are now?\u00a0 In the past the founder would be a prophet.\u00a0 Moses, Jesus, Mohammad, Joseph Smith, L Ron Hubbard (!).\u00a0 For my founding I\u2019ll settle for a trillionaire with virtually unlimited resources of artificial intelligence.\u00a0 Then he\u2019ll have to be a humanitarian, a philanthropist, a lover of mankind.\u00a0 Because he\u2019s going to have to take the long view.\u00a0 He\u2019ll know that to save mankind he\u2019ll have to start by rejecting a good chunk of humanity at the start.\u00a0 Because as humanity currently exists, there is a definite percentage of the population that can\u2019t be included in an optimized human environment.\u00a0 There is a twenty percent group that is hopeless.\u00a0 Some of them are uncontrollably violent.\u00a0 Some are completely unwilling to do work.\u00a0 Some are anti-social to the extent that they habitually commit various types of crime.\u00a0 It goes without saying utopia has no place for such individuals.<\/p>\n
The system that our founder builds must begin by trying to select a core of people that are unmistakenly outside of this 20%.\u00a0 The only way that the system can be founded is to start with the best starting material.\u00a0 So extremely careful biographical research into the initial candidates will have to be performed to rule out any unacceptable or even sub-optimal individuals.\u00a0 Ideally, married couples and even families of the highest quality should be incorporated in the starting material.\u00a0 This will build additional stability in the structure.<\/p>\n
But one thing that will be true is that even within this foundation of selected individuals there will need to be a continuous weeding out mechanism for people who fail or for the offspring who will be identified as failures.\u00a0 And if offspring are rejected, often the parents and siblings will find it impossible to stay inside the group.\u00a0 And not because this community is a hermetically sealed bubble.\u00a0 Everyone inside will be in contact with the outside world continuously.\u00a0 But if children of group members become dangerous, they must be kept outside of the community and that is hard to enforce unless the rest of the family is ejected.\u00a0 So, it becomes apparent that policing the group for anti-social activity will become one of the most important activities of the administrators.<\/p>\n
And as I mentioned in the earlier installment of this essay, those who are ejected are given the equity that they\u2019ve earned in the community when the leave so that they can find their own place in the world.\u00a0 So, what exactly are the rules of this club?\u00a0 Well, the founder gets to decide those.\u00a0 If he\u2019s wise, these rules are ones that will tend to increase stability, prosperity and social cohesion.\u00a0 What exactly these rules are may be dependent on the values and personal traits of this \u201cprophet.\u201d\u00a0 And ideally, there could be a number of different foundations to allow for the different but equally valid personality types that exist in our species.\u00a0 And maybe some of these will be failures and some will thrive.\u00a0 But over the course of time by trial and error a calculus for creating human communities could be derived.<\/p>\n
Now, what happens to those who can\u2019t be included.\u00a0 Well, nothing.\u00a0 They\u2019ll be on their own.\u00a0 This assumes that the larger human community still exists outside of these enclaves and that it has to deal with the full spectrum of human types.\u00a0 And that is why prisons and welfare exist.\u00a0 And that brings up another point.\u00a0 How would these societies be viewed by the outside world.\u00a0 My guess will be; poorly.\u00a0 I believe many nations would try to destroy them or at least force them to accept members that they would reject.\u00a0 And for that reason, the location of these societies may be one of the most important questions that the administrators will have to decide.\u00a0 Of course, trillionaires can do wonders with the right amount of bribery.\u00a0 But let\u2019s just say that a nuclear weapons program may be a necessity for this utopia of mine.<\/p>\n
When I write the next installment (and I may have to think about it for a while) I think I\u2019ll talk about education.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Okay, I said I\u2019d get down to details in setting up \u201cphotopia.\u201d\u00a0 Well, where do we start?\u00a0 The first question is how do you start<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1289,1263,4],"tags":[1267,5084,1176,4484,5083],"class_list":["post-35250","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction-by-me","category-stuff-that-personally-interests-me-miscellaneous","category-sff","tag-photogs-corner","tag-photopia","tag-science-fiction-and-fantasy","tag-the-american-archipelago-book-1-the-sniper","tag-utopia"],"yoast_head":"\n